October 18, 2012

Essie Winter 2012 Collection Swatches

Good morning guys! The other day I was shopping at Target and a new endcap display caught my eye, there was a crazy beautiful cobalt blue that screamed to me so I wandered over to see what it was. Much to my surprise it was Essie's Winter 2012 Collection, I think the name of it is the Leading Lady Collection but I'm not 100% sure about that. The collection as a whole is kind of random color wise but I really liked the majority of them in the bottle so they all came home with me. Check out all the swatches after the jump!

Beyond Cozy is very finely milled gold and silver glitter. In the store this leaned very gold, I was happily surprised when once I put it on it pulled a lot more silver on me most of the time. This polish is whoa, the glitter is insanely sparkly, it's one of those polishes that I'd be worried to wear while driving for fear of crashing from staring at my nails haha! The formula was awesome, not thick like I expected and the glitter was crazy dense. I only needed 2 coats for full opacity!

Shade

Butler Please is a bright cobalt blue creme. We can see why this called out to me, right? I don't care how many similar colors there are to this, I need them all. This was a bit of a pain to photograph, in real life it's a touch darker and has a bit of a dusty quality to it. The formula was really nice, a little sheer on the first coat but fully opaque with 2 coats. It also dried to a bit of a satin matte finish, I did use top coat for the photos.

Leading Lady is a dark red jelly packed with red glitter. This is another that called to me from the display, mostly because it reminded me of Essie's Ruby Slippers, which I love! The glitter in this was gorgeous out in the sun and it gave the polish amazing depth in the shade and indoors. If you like red glitters this is one you will definitely want to grab if you find it! The formula was great, really nice opacity, fully opaque in 2 coats. It was a little gritty and dull looking when it dried, I needed a couple coats of top coat to get it smooth and shiny.

Shade

She's Pampered is a medium/dark red creme. Nothing to write home about, but a great basic if you don't already own something similar. The formula was awesome, nearly a 1 coater! I ended up using 2 coats but it was hardly needed.

Snap Happy is a brighter more orange toned red creme. It looks much more similar in photos to She's Pampered than it does in real life. Another that isn't any spectacular but it's pretty. The formula was good, I used 2 coats for the photos below.

Where's My Chauffeur? is a light blue leaning turquoise. Love this shade but again, not unique...I'm still however dying about how much I loved this as a base for OPI's The Man With The Golden Gun, I've been fighting the urge to put that combo back on! The formula was really nice, not thick or streaky like shades like this can sometimes be. I used 2 coats for the photos below.

Overall I like the majority of this collection, I feel like the 2 red cremes are passable along with Where's My Chauffeur? but the other 3 are ones I'm happy to add to my collection. Beyond Cozy, Butler Please and Leading Lady are my easy picks from this collection.

So far I've only spotted this collection locally at Target, like I mentioned at the beginning of the post it was on an endcap at my local store. If you can't find it at a Target near you don't give up...the day I bought these I went to a couple other Target stores and out of the 3 only the first store had the end cap out. I'm sure these will be more widely available at drugstores soon if not already!

113 comments:

Great post and thank you for all the early swatches you always post!! <3I love Leading Lady and I'm happy to see they all have a nice formula! I'll probably also grab Butler Please and mabye Where is my chauffeur? Btw, is it similar to CG Aquadelic?

I want them so much, especially those favourite of yours, but I wouldn't mind having the whole collection... I've been obsessively checking eBay, but so far no luck... I hope someone there will have them on sale soon and for a reasonable price ;)

Beyond Cozy is beautiful. Now i'm going to be stalking all my local targets this weekend lol. Butler Please looks like Sally Hanen Extreme Wear - Pacific Blue. Maybe you can do a comparison on that one if you have it.

Beyond Cozy is beautiful. Now i'm going to be stalking all my local targets this weekend lol. Butler Please looks like Sally Hanen Extreme Wear - Pacific Blue. Maybe you can do a comparison on that one if you have it. Where's my Chauffeur looks out of place in this collection. But I love it, I have nothing like this in my collection. Another must have for me.

I'd be interested in seeing Butler Please and Essie Mezmerised compared. They both are in that mid-value cobalt blue family, but Mezmerized seems to be a bit more muted. Although you said Butler Please was more dusty in real life.

Beyond Cozy will probably wind up coming home with me. I would love to see a comp between Butler Please and Nails Inc Baker St or Sally Hansen Xtreme Wear Pacific Blue. Also Where's My Chauffeur and China Glaze Aquadelic. Thanks.

Agree with you - this one leaves me under-whelmed over all. 2 reds so similar - and yet they did not want to go back to fall and do an oxblood - an interesting green or real orange that we would want to wear after holiday and also to rock during US Thanksgiving season I think would have worked here - but maybe too many oranges out there with summer/spring then Halloween having blasted the market with oranges. I won't be picking up any of these. But then I have a huge collection and been into polish for 40+ yrs - so it's kind of hard to impress me. That said, I love it when Essie nails a good cream formula and sounds like the red and red/orange did that. I don't get Chauffeur? at all for winter. But because it's been so blasted hot still in so many places and maybe with all the color being shown this yr, it's in the OK range for a winter shade..but I would not carry a purse in this shade in winter...I did love, love it when you did the Man With the Golden Gun topper over it and have pulled out other turq creams I have to copy your look and love it...thinking I need to go for the toes with MWWTGG because I hate to waste it on fingers that only last me 2-3 days most of the time.

That happens to me a lot - I see 'em in person and am not in a buy mood or just feeling overwhelmed with the #'s of polish I have already - then I get remorseful not having some - go back and often the shade I want is goners...so this one despite I think I want nothing I will look carefully! One of those red creams is calling me is my guess and I just have not heard it yet.

I would love to see a comparison of the red cremes with other essie reds and a comparison of where's my chauffeur? to essie mint candy apple and essie turquoise & caicos! Love your swatches btw, they are some of the best online, your blog is definitely my first choice for swatches! I gotta say I'm really tempted by the glitters, especially leading lady....

Can you please do a comparison between Essie Leading Lady, Essie Ruby Slippers, and China Glaze Ruby Pumps? I've searched high and low for Ruby Slippers, but have only been able to find Ruby Pumps. I would love to see how Leading Lady stacks up.

can you compare beyond cozy to OPI designer de better from last years muppets collection? also i'd love to see butler please compared to sally hansen pacific blue. love your blog, read it every day & look forward to your posts!

Thanks Katie :) I actually don't own either of the Essie's you mentioned (crazy, I know) so I can't do those. Going through all my reds is on my list, it probably won't be included in this upcoming post but it's on my list to do eventually! It's just a huge project!

Thanks for all the work you put into this! Yup, I think you're right. I have Ruby Pumps and it's a true bright red. And for anyone who cares, Zoya Blaze seems more raspberry & darker red than RP (I don't have Zoya, but do have the nail spoon). All beautiful

Can you do comparisons between Butler Please and Sally Hansen Pacific Blue? Also with Essie Mesmorize (I'm not sure if they're totally different...I don't own it but I've seen pictures where it's similar and ones where it's darker). And then between Where's My Chauffer? and Essie Turquoise and Caicos and China Glaze For Audrey? Thanks!

I saw someone recommend Where's My Chauffeur this a.m. and went in search of it at Target. They didn't have this collection set out yet, but a very nice SA found it in back for me. It's definitely more blue-leaning than Turquoise & Caicos, which is what I've been looking for. Very pretty! I'll be interested to see it vs. Aquadelic because I've been looking for that one since I liked the bluer shade vs. some of the other "Tiffany" blues.

Thanks for the post! Love your blog. I wonder how close "Where's My Chauffeur" is to China Glaze Aquadelic and Audrey, and Zoya Wednesday. If you could do a swatch to compare these that would be so so so awesome!!!!!

If you ever do a comparison swatch, pls let me know how they compare in terms of the sparkle factor. I do realise that both of them have different type of glitters but I already have Crown me already so i'm considering if it's necessary to get this. Thanks for the review! :)

Soooooooooooo pretty! And such a happy, vibrant collection for the holidays! :D I am in love with Leading Lady of course as I am a red glitter fiend (and glitter fiend in general, lol!). Also really loving Beyond Cozy! I love the blend of the finely milled glitters and I'm happy to hear it's super sparkly. :D I must own Butler Please - I adore blues like that! It looks so clean and vibrant! I might need to get Where's My Chauffeur? because I heard it's a bluer-leaning version of Turquoise and Caicos (one of my favorites of that kind of shade!). I'm still thinking of your Where's My Chauffeur?/Man with the Golden Gun mani - the two polishes looked gorgeous together! :D I'll need to start carrying some of my red color wheels in my bag for comparison purposes to see if I need Snap Happy and/or She's Pampered. Many of my favorite red polishes are by Essie so these two are tempting but my stash is ginormous and the last thing I need is another dupe for something I already have. Thank you so much for the beautiful swatches! I have been on the hunt for this collection at my local pro nail supply, Target, and all the drugstores (Walgreen's, CVS, Rite Aid, etc.) but no luck yet. >.< I hope I find it soon because Leading Lady, Beyond Cozy, and Butler Please = must haves for me! Again, many thanks for your beautiful swatches and awesome review! <3

Beyond Cozy, is pretty much an exact dupe for Sally Hansen Golden-I. I think sally hansens is a little more Golden, and vibrant then beyond cozy. and you only need one coat of Saly hansen. Overal, just about an exact dupe for beyond cozy and a lot cheaper!

I just picked up Leading Lady, thinking it would be a fun choice for the holidays. I loved the color, but was so disappointed that it chipped so easily, even with a couple coats of top coat. :( Did you have the same trouble? I didn't even need polish remover on many of my nails because I could actually peel chunks right off! So bummed!

I have the same problem with leading lady. It just comes off the nail in one big flake, taking with it the CND Stickey base coat. I was really careful using remover before applying polish and have tried both with Seche Vite and Poshe as top coat - which makes no difference.

I have similar wear issues with leading lady. All the polish comes off in one big flake after a day or two, despite diligent cleansing of nail with remover, CND Stickey base coat and either Seche Vite or Poshe top coats (no difference). I figure it has to do with the jelly, but I have little experience with jelly polishes. I find leading lady so pretty, so would love any tips on how to increase longevity.

I find Essie Butler Please and Where's My Chauffeur very difficult to apply. After looking at the product reviews online I see I'm not the only one. What's your secret? I also find that Butler chips like crazy while at least once I get Where's My Chauffeur on, it at least behaves lol and doesn't show wear for at least a week.

I lovee Where's My Chauffeur and my friend is going to America in the next few weeks! Where can she buy Essie nail polish in America? I think Nordstrom, Walgreens, and CVS Pharmacy have Essie(and Target?), but do you know where are the best places to find a large selection of colors? Thanks and I love your blog! :) Your nails are so beautiful :D